The Georgia Southern Eagles have been within a touchdown in the fourth quarter in every game but one this year, with the lone blowout game being their season opening 59-7 win against Morgan State. The Eagles could be 6-0 or 1-5 at this point, but five turnovers proved too much to overcome as they dropped a 41-33 decision on the road at Georgia State Saturday afternoon as they fell to 3-3 overall and 0-2 in Sun Belt play. 

“With the schedule we have we kind of knew we would have a lot of games decided in the fourth quarter,” said Eagle head coach Clay Helton. “When we play good football and don’t shoot ourselves in the foot we come out on the good end. When you play a game in which you have five turnovers and some self-inflicted wounds those are the games you are going to lose in the fourth quarter.” 

The Eagle defense was gashed by the Panther offense for 521 yards of total offense including 335 yards on the ground. Helton feels the Eagles have improved as far as tackling but is still concerned with things like gap assignments. 

“I thought Georgia State came in with a great plan in terms of the run game,” said Helton. “Their tempo makes you get lined up fast and you have to keep things simple. Most of our issues were not with tackling, it was with missed fits. Every man is supposed to be responsible for a gap, and a lot of time because of tempo we slipped out of gaps. When you look at the explosive plays they had, more times than not it was because of a man being away from his gap or trying to chase a responsibility that was not his.” 

The Eagles players acknowledged that the problems they have been having on defense are indeed their own issues rather than a problem with the defensive scheme. 

“It’s on us as players,” said Eagle defensive back Justin Birdsong. “We actually just had a players only meeting without coaches addressing these problems as the defense. We felt like we probably should have already had this meeting because we are asking our offense to score 41 points every game for us to have a chance at winning. Coach Will Harris does a great job at putting together a game plan, and I know he takes a lot of heat for what we are doing as a defense. Every play he comes up with to counter what the offense is doing there is a gap designed for a specific player. We need to trust that everyone will be in their gap. We sometimes have that superhero mentality where we try and do everyone’s job when we need to just make sure we are where we are supposed to be.” 

Despite the five turnovers the Eagle offense did have a pretty productive day as they piled up 451 yards of total offense including 359 yards coming through the air. Kyle Vantrease set an Eagle school record for single season passing yards Saturday and is also nearing the school record for touchdown passes in a season as he is at 13 and the record is 15. He is also, unfortunately coming close to the school record in interceptions for a season which is 14 and he currently has 11. A couple of the interceptions Saturday were tough to pin on the quarterback as there was a dropped pass that led to one and he got hit on another and coach Helton has full confidence in Vantrease being able to bounce back this week. 

The loss drops the Eagles to 3-3 overall and 0-2 in Sun Belt play. Up next the Eagles will welcome in No. 25 ranked James Madison to Paulson Stadium for a 4:00 kickoff Saturday afternoon.